The present invention relates to a reaction apparatus for a fluid, which is designed to be employed in the production of a chemical substance, in the synthesis of new material and in the discovery of a novel synthesizing method, and, in particular, to a reaction apparatus using a microreactor and suited for use under high-temperature/high-pressure conditions, especially even under the conditions for a supercritical fluid.
In an attempt to make it possible to apply the microreactor to a supercritical fluid and to a high-temperature/high-pressure process, there has been conventionally proposed, as shown in JP Published Patent Application No. 2006-061903(A) for example, techniques wherein the microreactor is assembled as a module in such a manner that a plurality of high-pressure fine tubes are bundled each other and the opposite ends thereof are respectively joined into a single tube.
Further, in an attempt to provide a treatment system for the process utilizing a high-pressure fluid such as a supercritical fluid without necessitating any kind of compressor, there has been proposed, as shown in JP Published Patent Application No. 2003-126673(A) for example, techniques to utilize a pressure to be derived from thermal expansion.
According to any of the aforementioned prior techniques, it is imperative to increase the pressure of inflow side to a high pressure and to reduce the pressure by making use of a pressure-reducing valve after the fluid is cooled down on the inflow side. As a result, these prior techniques are accompanied with not only a problem that clogging may be caused to generate, giving damage to the reliability of techniques but also various problems that it is difficult to keep the pressure even if the flow rate of fluid is very low, to increase the reaction temperature and to make them maintenance-free. Due to these reasons, these conventional techniques are not sufficiently applicable to a wide range of high-temperatures and high-pressures.